


Technical Difficulties

by TARDISTraveller42



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Adventure, Hurt/Comfort, Robots, Suspense, Time Travel, Whump, spaceship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-22
Updated: 2017-08-22
Packaged: 2018-12-18 15:56:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,999
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11877876
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TARDISTraveller42/pseuds/TARDISTraveller42
Summary: The Doctor attempts to save a failing spaceship, but the robot driver has other plans, like attacking anyone who comes near the controls. Looks like Clara is going to have to rescue her damsel in distress again.





	Technical Difficulties

Technical Difficulties

Clara’s adrenaline was running high as she sprinted down the final corridor of Intergalactic 9, the best spaceship money could but in the 39th century, according to the Doctor. Then again, he also said people in this century spent billions each year on tonic water, so Clara wasn’t sure what to think. In her mind, this spaceship was nothing but neverending metal hallways, all intersecting with each other in maze-like patterns. The sooner they got back to the TARDIS, the better, in her opinion.

Clara halted when she reached the door to the main control room. The Doctor was supposed to meet her here, at this time, and then explain the rest of their plan. Her eyes darted around the corner, finding an empty, blank corridor. She bit her lip and went back to the door, careful to stay well below the small porthole window near the top. It was a lucky day to be hardly five feet tall. She smiled to herself as she fixed her frizzy, sweaty hair and leaned against the wall.

The Doctor came bounding around the corner a few moments later, his eyes wide with that adventurous gleam they always held during the climax of their trips. Clara knew instantly that he actually had a plan, maybe even a good one if his confident movements were to be believed. He crouched under the porthole beside her, not a dot of sweat on his forehead though they’d both been running for the past two hours.

“Clara,” he said in a hushed voice. “Do you remember those robots we saw earlier?”

“The maintenance crew, yeah?”

“I need you to disable them.”

Clara’s eyebrow raised. “How do I do that?”

The Doctor’s lips quirked into a smirk as he reached into his pocket and pulled out the Sonic Screwdriver. The little device lifted a weight from Clara’s chest. For a second, she thought she’d have to do a whole red-wire-or-blue-wire routine.

“Take this, go to that cupboard over there,” he pointed to the far end of the corridor, where a rectangle of wall was traces in black. “Setting 242 should do the trick.”

Clara nodded and started down the hall before whirling around again. “What are you gonna do?”

A mad look came into the Doctor’s eye, and the weight returned to Clara’s chest. “I’m going to save this ship from itself.”

He put his hands on the door latch and gestured for her to get going, which she did with slight reluctance. Somehow, she knew this was not all going to go perfectly to plan.

The cupboard popped open easily enough, revealing a tangle of wires and buttons. Clara could practically feel the electricity buzzing through every inch of the tech that was far past her understanding. Suddenly she felt a great respect and adoration for the Sonic Screwdriver, for not making her touch the wires and things manually.

She set the screwdriver to 242, like the Doctor had said, and pressed the button. A few sparks flew, but they were harmless and even a little cool looking, like a small fireworks display. Clara kept the button held until the Doctor was well into the control room, then released it and wiped her sweaty forehead. Perhaps this trip really was going to end well.

The Doctor approached the control panel with a wary eye on its driver, an automated robot. He trusted that Clara had disabled it properly, but it was an eight foot tall metal bot without pain receptors, a frightening sight even if its head was drooped down, lights off.

He shook off his anxieties and went to the panel beside the robot driver, switching around a few coordinates and turning a few dials. A message popped up on the screen in front of him, warning of someone tampering with the controls, and the Doctor smiled. “That would be me.”

He flipped off the screen with a flourish and danced over to one of the other control panels on the far side of the robot. Over here, he felt even more confident, pulling levers and pressing buttons like he’d been flying this ship since birth. With a smug grin, he cranked one last switch and then spun around. The robot was stood directly in front of him, eyes red.

The Doctor hardly had time to step back, his leg meeting the edge of the console, when the robot's arm reached out and splayed its fingers out in front of his neck. In a mechanical voice void of any emotion, it said, “You are trespassing. State your name and purpose of being here.”

The Doctor’s head tilted to the side. “Well, trespasser about sums me up.”

The robot’s hand clamped around the Doctor’s throat, and suddenly stars were twinkling at the edge of his vision. The bot’s body then swivelled around, and it dragged the Doctor to the wall beside them, away from the controls. The Doctor’s hand limply tried prying the mechanical humanoid off of him, but it was no use. The thing had amped up strength, probably some inventor’s pride and joy. Oh, how the Doctor hated the human need for constant progress, especially when it came to violent machines without a conscience.

He tried to call out; to tell Clara it was not setting 242, actually, it was probably 232 or 504. He couldn’t be expected to memorize them all, could he? But his vocal chords were trapped beneath the grip of the metal that was digging relentlessly into his neck. 

As if things couldn’t get any worse, suddenly the Doctor felt his feet rise up off the floor. In his dimming vision, he saw the robot’s arm pushing him up the wall his back was trapped against, making the whole process faster but worse at the same time.

The Doctor knew he couldn’t last much longer like this. He was running out of air, even with his respiratory bypass system, and he couldn’t hope to get any more with the metal clamped around his throat as it was. His vision was fading to black, eyes shutting and then opening in primal terror every few seconds. Ringing in his ears drowned out any other noise happening in the room. Weakly, his hands were still grasping at the robot’s fingers, dumbly trying to get the thing off of him, but all of his efforts were just wasting more energy. 

Clara entered the room in a winner’s glow, thinking that they were still about to celebrate, and go to Mars for cocktails or maybe a buffet. But as soon as her eyes landed on the scene in front of her, she froze, mouth gaping open in terror.

The robot’s hand was closed around the Doctor’s neck, staring up at him with red glowing eyes as it muttered about trespassers and laws. Worse than the image of the bot was the Doctor. His face was turning a deep shade of red, his veins popping and eyes trying to stay open under heavy lids. When Clara noticed his feet, six inches off of the floor, something in her snapped.

Clara charged at the robot, brandishing only the screwdriver and a shout of anger. The device buzzed excitedly in her hand, and then stuck neay into one of the ports on the robot’s back. For one second, it’s grasp seemed to tighten yet further on the Doctor. Then it’s limbs went limp and it crashed back onto the floor, breaking a few batteries and connective wires in the process.

The Doctor crashed to the floor just after the robot, caught only just in Clara’s arms as his legs failed to support him. Coughing and sputtering, he curled up on his side, face red and, in some areas, slightly purple. 

“Doctor, breathe. Just breathe.”

Clara set his head gently on the floor and backed up to give him some space. In between coughs, he took in short, wheezing gasps.

His eyes were rimmed with red and unfocused even as his coughing came to a slow end. At least, Clara noted, his face was now pink, and not the deep shade of maroon it had been. She shuddered at the memory of him held limply in that thing’s arm.

The Doctor’s hand reached out toward her and she took it in both of her own, edging closer to him now that he was breathing a little easier. In return, he shifted closer to her, holding his other hand tightly on her knee, trying to connect with her in any way possible. Tears pricked into Clara’s eyes. 

“I’m here.”

“Clara-”

“Shh,” she brushed a thumb through the hair just above his temple. “Take it easy.”

His eyes blinked up at her. They were brighter than before, but still had dark circles beneath. “It wasn’t setting 242. It was 424.”

Clara couldn’t help but smile, shaking her head. “What am I going to do with you?”

He didn’t have the voice left to reply, so he simply smiled and leaned into her lap, letting her play with his hair for a few minutes as he recovered. It wasn’t often this regeneration let her get this close and touchy with him, so Clara revelled in it while she could. If only moments like these didn’t always have to come from such terrible experiences.

“Doctor?”

He shifted beneath her and opened his eyes again.

“You did save the ship already, right? We’re not still heading for that star?”

The Doctor let his eyes close again. “Sorted.”

Clara relaxed finally, and settled into her little spot against the wall. Her fingers still brushed through the Doctor’s hair, occasionally stroking his cheek in a soothing rhythm that made both of them sleepy. Fifteen minutes passed like this before Clara suddenly realized she’d fallen asleep for at least ten of those minutes.

“Doctor? Do you want to go back to the TARDIS?”

He seemed to think about this for a moment, and then made to sit up, only successfully doing so with Clara’s assistance. Then she also aided him in standing and, with more difficulty, walking.

“We could’ve just stayed until you were feeling a bit better.”

The Doctor’s arm draped over Clara’s shoulder awkwardly, his opposite hand rubbing gently across his neck. “No, that’s fine. I want to get back to the TARDIS.”

Clara watched him carefully for a moment as he swallowed with a wince, and then she turned back to the corridor in front of her. “For someone so skinny, you really are tough to carry, you know.”

They smiled together, but Clara only felt partially relieved. The Doctor was still being uncharacteristically quiet, and was leaning most of his weight on her when he usually leaned directly away from help of any kind. The sooner they got to the TARDIS, the better.

The blue box came into view a few minutes later, much to Clara and her aching arms’ content. She unlocked the door and held it for them both as they clambered in, then helped the Doctor to the console before shutting the doors with a click of a lock. 

In the gentle yellow glow of the ship, Clara took in his form with a critical eye. Just in the bottom center of his throat was a dark bruise that crawled up half of his neck. It looked very painful, and it made Clara wince just looking at it.

“Are you alright?”

The Doctor absentmindedly rubbed a hand over his neck again, and then turned away from her, to the controls. “Yeah, I’m fine. Thank you, by the way. For the rescue.”

Clara bit her lip. He was up for holding hands, leaning on her, and now giving a proper ‘thank you’. He was definitely in quite a state, and that robot was definitely getting disassembled by a schoolteacher if she ever met it again.

For now, she settled for wrapping an arm through his and resting her head on his shoulder. “You’re welcome to my rescuing any time.”


End file.
